PARTLY DISSENTING OPINION BY MR. B. CONFORTI

I regret not to be able to agree with the majority of the Commission insofar as it reached the conclusion that there was a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 in the present case.

In the cases of Spadea and Scalabrino v. Italy  and Scollo v. Italy (paras. 36 - 38 and 35 - 37  respectively) the Court, after stating that housing shortages are an almost universal problem of modern society, went on saying that the Italian system of staggering of the grant of police assistance is not in itself incompatible with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, provided that it manages to strike a fair balance between the competing interests at stake. The Court noted that the Italian system aims at protecting tenants on low income who deserve social protection, providing though exceptions aiming at protecting the interests of  landlords who urgently need to recover their property for themselves or their family and who are owed arrears of rent. Applying these principles to the particular circumstances of each case,  the Court reached two opposite conclusions, namely that Mr. Scollo’s rights under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 were violate, whereas Mr. Spadea’s and Mrs. Scalabrino’s property rights were not.

I find it difficult to accept that the principles laid down by the Court in September 1995 should not be applied today and to agree with the opinion expressed by the majority of the Commission that a violation of landlords’ property rights occurs in any case, by the mere reason of the staggering of the grant of police assistance.